Things people do that irritate you when you go to the zoo? #2

Was legitimately stressed at a zoo for the first time today in the Natural Treasures building of the John Ball Zoo. There was like a large group of maybe 20 kids screaming at the top of their lungs (temper tantrum volume) using the halls as a playground while their parents didn't care. Many were banging on the glass of the armadillo exhibit trying to get it to curl up like Tuk Tuk from Raya and the Last Dragon (did not even know that movie was successful enough to give armadillos the same alternate name to kids that Nemo gave to clownfish, never mind thay he doesn't look like a modern armadillo at all and is more like a glyptodont/pill bug hybrid). The sad irony is that it is a six banded armadillo, and that species cannot do that. It seemed terrified and the keepers couldn't do anything about it because they were occupied with something with the grand cayman blue iguana and reticulated python in a way that no staff in that building were available to yell at them to stop.
 
Brayden Delashmutt said:
Oh, and am I the only one who hates when people say the animal looks "sad" that it's in a cage? AZA zoos get so much hate from uneducated people.
Click to expand...

TinoPup said:
That's a common complaint we all share, I think :) Like people complaining about animals pacing or sleeping.
Click to expand...

Tied in with the assumption an animal must be lonely because it’s on it’s own. Aside from the obvious example of solitary species, even some social animals prefer their own company and are housed on their own because they can’t be a safely mixed with others of their species. It largely comes down to people projecting their own emotions onto animals.
 
I was at Henry Vilas for Boo at the Zoo last week, and I spent most of my visit watching Aayla the aardvark. On top of the usual misidentifications, kids were banging on the glass while she was trying to take a nap, and she visibly flinched a couple times. Worst of all, though, was one kid who kept banging on the glass while screaming "Bunny! Bunny! Bunny!" and kicking me in the ankle.
 
TinoPup said:
That's a common complaint we all share, I think :) Like people complaining about animals pacing or sleeping.
Click to expand...

I agree that it is annoying when visitors complain about animals who look “sad” or who are sleeping or who live alone, but I think complaints about pacing animals are more reasonable. Sure, pacing can mean a lot of things, but at a certain point if I see the same animal pacing back and forth in its exhibit for hours on end it does make me feel uncomfortable.
 
ZooElephantsMan said:
I agree that it is annoying when visitors complain about animals who look “sad” or who are sleeping or who live alone, but I think complaints about pacing animals are more reasonable. Sure, pacing can mean a lot of things, but at a certain point if I see the same animal pacing back and forth in its exhibit for hours on end it does make me feel uncomfortable.
Click to expand...
I heard a new perspective recently on zoo animal pacing that's really quite interesting. Most often when discussing pacing, it's some sort of carnivore that's the animal in question, usually a feline species. These are species that in the wild tend to be territorial, often times in the wild patrolling the border of their territory. Thus, when in a captive setting, pacing behavior is derived from this wild behavior, making it actually a fairly natural behavior for a lot of carnivores. Granted, there is one way to help prevent pacing- and it's certainly a difficult solution- but it's to add complexity to an exhibit (rocks, climbing structures, plants, etc.). Adding this complexity makes it more difficult to walk in a straight line. However, this is much more something to consider when building new habitats, and isn't really feasible when looking at all the existing habitats. It was definitely a very interesting perspective to hear, and it adds some more nuance to this fairly common behavior.
 
ZooElephantsMan said:
I agree that it is annoying when visitors complain about animals who look “sad” or who are sleeping or who live alone, but I think complaints about pacing animals are more reasonable. Sure, pacing can mean a lot of things, but at a certain point if I see the same animal pacing back and forth in its exhibit for hours on end it does make me feel uncomfortable.
Click to expand...

None of the people who complain are sticking around long enough to see that it's for hours.
 
Corangurilla said:
I was at Henry Vilas for Boo at the Zoo last week, and I spent most of my visit watching Aayla the aardvark. On top of the usual misidentifications, kids were banging on the glass while she was trying to take a nap, and she visibly flinched a couple times. Worst of all, though, was one kid who kept banging on the glass while screaming "Bunny! Bunny! Bunny!" and kicking me in the ankle.
Click to expand...
And I bet my knee the mum said to you "oh sorry, but you know, it's just a kid:)"
 
When parents can't tell their children that when you enter a nocturnal house you need to be quiet, and explain to them it's dark in there. Even if the parent don't know it would be dark, there's usually always a sign before you go in.

The children then all scream "why is it dark in here ?????" They kept on screaming, and I decided to tell them to please be quiet, but then off course, the parents won't accept me "teaching" their bratty kids, and looked at me like I was the devil in person. I honestly don't care.

Or when people are shouting "it's a Lynx" dozens of times, while actually looking at the map they are holding right in front of them, pointing at the correct spot, still shouting that it's a Lynx, when in fact, it will say Ocelot on the map where they are pointing at.
Like, how ??
 
Mickey said:
And I bet my knee the mum said to you "oh sorry, but you know, it's just a kid:)"
Click to expand...
Nah, I didn’t say anything. He wasn’t being malicious, just excited and unaware of what his foot was hitting. All I said was “aardvark” in a slightly annoyed tone every time he said “Bunny!”.
 
I may have mentioned this elsewhere, but when I see zoo visitors lumping similar animals under one name it really irritates me. Visitors don't know what an aye-aye is, nor do they know enough about taxonomy to know that apes aren't monkeys, which is fine, but it would be nice if they at least read the name on the sign to understand the animal which they are looking at. To me, it seems as though every primate is a 'monkey,' every raptor is an 'eagle,' every wild pig is a 'warthog' and every pinniped is a 'seal' in the eyes of most zoo visitors.

In some ways, I find this worse than misidentification. Everybody misidentifies sometimes, and in all honesty I do not have a problem with it, but 'lumping' shows that that they know what type of animal something is, but are too ignorant to learn anything more specific, and it gives the impression which they know what they are talking about, when they do not.

Something else is when parents cannot correct their children. I once saw a child say that London Zoo's anteater was an 'elephant,' which is fine. They were very young, saw an animal with a long nose and stated that it was what many would consider the world's most iconic animal - understandable. The parents glared at each other, barely able to hold in their laughter, but instead of politely saying, "no, that is an anteater," they said "well done!" That is the worst example, but there are others.
 
ZooElephantsMan said:
I agree that it is annoying when visitors complain about animals who look “sad” or who are sleeping or who live alone, but I think complaints about pacing animals are more reasonable. Sure, pacing can mean a lot of things, but at a certain point if I see the same animal pacing back and forth in its exhibit for hours on end it does make me feel uncomfortable.
Click to expand...
Moorhunhe said:
When parents can't tell their children that when you enter a nocturnal house you need to be quiet, and explain to them it's dark in there. Even if the parent don't know it would be dark, there's usually always a sign before you go in.

The children then all scream "why is it dark in here ?????" They kept on screaming, and I decided to tell them to please be quiet, but then off course, the parents won't accept me "teaching" their bratty kids, and looked at me like I was the devil in person. I honestly don't care.

Or when people are shouting "it's a Lynx" dozens of times, while actually looking at the map they are holding right in front of them, pointing at the correct spot, still shouting that it's a Lynx, when in fact, it will say Ocelot on the map where they are pointing at.
Like, how ??
Click to expand...

Ikr? You'd think that the parents would intervene, but "hey, its just a kid". Its so annoying, especially when the animal is already a very shy animal.
 
Child free days:

I think it’d be accurate to say the majority of ZooChatters would be in favour of designating a handful of days a year as adults only days - so people can enjoy the zoo without being surrounded by screaming kids.

I’m not talking of an after hours Valentines Day themed event where you pay three times the admission and get a glass of bubbly you down in one; I’m talking of child free admission days.

They’ll be endless opinions on what the age limit should be and how regular this could/should be implemented - but it’d be interesting to see what sort of uptake it would get.
 
Zoofan15 said:
Child free days:

I think it’d be accurate to say the majority of ZooChatters would be in favour of designating a handful of days a year as adults only days - so people can enjoy the zoo without being surrounded by screaming kids.

I’m not talking of an after hours Valentines Day themed event where you pay three times the admission and get a glass of bubbly you down in one; I’m talking of child free admission days.

They’ll be endless opinions on what the age limit should be and how regular this could/should be implemented - but it’d be interesting to see what sort of uptake it would get.
Click to expand...
As much as I agree on this, financially speaking the zoo could have some problems and their reputation could somehow drop, I don't exactly know how but not admitting children could make some shady theories arise?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top